The Curse of the Sequel: Analyzing the "Sequel Scores" of the Conjuring Universe

Is there another genre that is as popular in making sequels as horror? Halloween, Saw, and Child's Play are just a few horror series that keep coming back to scare people again and again with lots of scary follow-ups. These sequels make us wonder: do they live up to the first movie? We had the same question. Usually, people think sequels don't match the first one, but at IMDb, we take a more scientific look. We check ratings to see how these movies compare, and that's how the "sequel score" was created.

The sequel score looks at how much a sequel's IMDb rating changed compared to the original.

 We use this to see if a sequel is successful or not, and we put it into one of four groups:  

Cursed (Severe Decline): These sequels got lower ratings than the original by more than 5%.

 It's a really bad fate.

Example: A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge got 5.5/10, while the first movie got 7.4/10.

Haunted (Moderate Decline): These sequels are lower than the original but not by much—between 2% and 5%.

 Still scary, but the fun is fading.

Example: Final Destination 2 got 6.2/10, while the first movie got 6.7/10.

In Limbo (Neutral): These sequels are slightly higher or lower than the original, but the difference is less than 2%.

 They're similar to the first, either good or bad.

Example: Friday the 13th Part 2 got 6.1/10, while the original got 6.4/10.

Resurrected (Exceptional Sequel): These sequels have higher ratings than the original by at least 2%.

 They come back stronger than before.

Example: The Purge: Anarchy got 6.4/10, while the first movie got 5.8/10.

With The Conjuring: Last Rites in theaters and new news about a "The Conjuring" TV series coming to HBO Max, it's a great time to check how the sequel scale works.

 It's important to remember that ratings are personal. If you love The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It, we don't question that.

James Wan's The Conjuring came out in 2013 and has a strong IMDb rating of 7.5.

 Three years later, The Conjuring 2 came out and got 7.3, which is almost the same. With a change of less than 2%, this sequel is in the neutral category. Eight years later, The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It came out with an IMDb rating of 6.3, which is a 16% drop from the original. That makes it a cursed sequel because of the big rating drop.

Now, in 2025, The Conjuring: Last Rites made a big opening weekend, earning $83 million and over 14,000 IMDb ratings.

 It currently has a rating of 6.5, which is a 15% decrease from the original movie. That’s another cursed sequel. Only time and more ratings will show how fans really feel about Last Rites. When looking at the whole franchise, Last Rites has done better with fans than the previous movie, which was The Nun II from 2023.